HENCEFORWARD you are to consider us as cut off from the ordinary routine of society, leading somewhat of a patriarchal life; or rather living in the style of the old feudal Barons, enjoying, in proud solitude, the grandeur of our rocks and mountains, surrounded by warm-hearted faithful dependants, and with no rival chieftain within a distance of fifteen miles. The pitching our tent in this wilderness was not, indeed, effected without considerable difficulties, and many privations; but however interesting a topic this might have proved, during the period of suffering, when, I doubt not, you would

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often have sympathised, and sometimes, perhaps, have laughed at the recital of these minor "miseries of human life," yet, at this distance of time, there can be little amusement in recalling them.

As we might now promise you a more hospitable and less unpolished welcome than we could then have offered, I could even wish (provided I could ensure you one fine day in the course of the week) that you were here, to enjoy, in rapid succession, and, with all its wild magnificence, the whirlwind, the tempest, the ocean's swell, and, as Burns beautifully expresses it,

"Some gleams of sunshine, 'mid renewing storms."

To-day there have been fine bright intervals, and, while returning from a hasty ride, I have been greatly delighted with the appearance of a rainbow, gradually advancing before the lowering clouds, sweeping with majestic stride across the troubled ocean, then as it gained the beach, and seemed almost within my grasp, vanishing amid the storm, of which it had been the lovely, but treacherous forerunner. It is, I suppose, a consequence of our situation, and the close connexion between sea and mountain, that the rainbows here are so frequent, and so peculiarly beautiful. Of an amazing breadth, and with colours

vivid beyond description, I know not whether most to admire this aerial phenomenon when, suspended in the western sky, one end of the bow sinks behind the island of Boffin, while, at the distance of several leagues, the other rests upon the misty hills of Ennis Turc; or when, at a later hour of the day, it has appeared stretched across the ample sides of Müllrea, penetrating far into the deep blue waters that flowed at its base. With feelings of grateful recollection too, we may hail the repeated visits of this heavenly messenger, occasionally as often as five or six times in the course of the same day, in a country exposed to such astonishing, and, at times, almost incessant floods of rain.

Often and often am I reminded of the rainy seasons that we read of within the tropics; then again the soft mild weather, which frequently precedes or follows this temporary deluge, would rather seem to resemble the general temperature of Devonshire, or South Wales; and it is only when the rude gale blows, in full force, across the broad Atlantic, that I really believe myself, to use the expression of a stranger the other day, in the next parish to America.

It is a happy effect of this extreme mildness and moisture of climate, that most of our hills are covered with grass to a considerable height;

and afford good pasturage both in summer and winter. The grasses most abundant are the dogstail (cynosurus cristatus), several species of the meadow grass (poa), the fescue (festuca duriuscula and pratensis), and particularly the sweet-scented vernal grass (anthoxanthum odoratum), which abounds in the dry pastures, and mountain sides; where its withered blossoms, which it is remarkable that the cattle do not eat, give a yellowish brown tint to the whole pasture. Our bog lands are overrun with the couch, or fiorin grass (agrostis stolonifera), several other species of the agrostis, and the aira. After the long controversy that has taken place on the subject of fiorin grass, it is worth while to observe, that the hay made of it actually fetches a better price than common hay, when carried to the little market town of Cliefden, and is therefore commonly cut by the country people, who make it into small stacks for winter use.

This is, indeed, the country for a botanist, and one so indefatigable as yourself, would not hesitate to venture with us across the rushy bog, where you would be so well rewarded for the labour of springing from one knot of rushes to another, by meeting with the fringed blossoms of the bogbean (menyanthes trifoliata,) the yellow asphodel (narthecium os

sifragum), the pale bog violet (viola palustris,) both species of the pinguicula, and of the beautiful drosera, the English fly-trap, spreading its dewy leaves glistening in the sun. I could also point out to you, almost hid in the moist recesses of some dripping rock, the pretty miniature fern (trichomanes Tunbridgensis) which you may remember shewing me for the first time at Tunbridge-Wells; the osmunda lunaria and regalis are also to be found, with other ferns, mosses, and lichens, which it is far beyond my botanical skill to distinguish.

The man of science, to whatever branch of natural history his attention is directed, will indeed find never-failing sources of gratification, in exploring paths, hitherto almost untrodden, in our wild country. Scarcely a county in England is without its peculiar Flora, almost every hill and every valley has been subject to repeated scientific examination; while the productions of Nature, so bountifully accorded to poor Ireland, are either unknown, or disregarded-a sad, but too certain consequence of her civil disturbances.

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